this post was submitted on 03 Mar 2026
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For me, Tunic. Well, it's a bit more complicated. I was burnt out on soulslikes and wanted a break. Saw what I thought was a nice little Zelda clone, as in I was scrolling the Steam store home page and did a double take when I saw the one and only piece of promotional art for the game. That character design looked like it was one floppy green hat away from a lawsuit from Nintendo. Instantly downloaded it upon learning that the instruction manual played a big part in the gameplay.

I have fond memories of game manuals when I was a kid, coming home from not-yet-gamestop with a new game looking at all the concept art, or having my parents read to me from the super mario 3 manual when I was little. Anyway, long story short the game was another soulslike. Set in the ruins of a fallen civilization? Check. Spend currency to level up? Check. Opening up shortcuts to previously visited areas as you progress? Check. Difficult bosses? Check.

Oh, but what's this? The whole game is in this indecipherable script that you have to decode? Oh baby! I spent way, way way too much time trying to decipher it. I got so obsessed that it was effecting my sleep and I had to uninstall the game for a few weeks. Never ended up solving it.

spoilerI knew it was an English cipher from the beginning. Nobody ever goes full conlang, as much as I would love that. I got as far as deducing it was phonemic, as the same glyphs kept appearing before cleartext words, which I assumed were "a/an" and "the", and the way "the" was written made me think it was two glyphs, one for the and one for . The last thing I got before giving up and looking it up online was one of hte ghosts standing next to the well in the village and repeating the same word three times. Of course he's saying "well well well".

Anyway, overall the experience was a roller coaster of mild interest to acute dislike shifting to all consuming curiosity and finally to exasperation. I don't think a game has evoked that many varied reactions from me. The music is also amazing.

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[–] justdaveisfine@piefed.social 4 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Against the Storm.

Its a 'roguelike' colony builder where you're basically starting a colony as quick as you can, then once it starts to get established and run well, you leave and move onto the next one.

I was thinking it was something closer to a city builder where you're managing something from start to finish and didn't expect to like the roguelike aspect but I think it works well.

Its just got a neat little art style, a bunch of fantasy races with particular quirks, strange biomes with pros/cons, and has a bunch of lore tidbits sprinkled throughout.

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[–] TheLunatickle@lemmy.zip 4 points 1 month ago

Tainted grail Fall of Avalon.

[–] samus12345@sh.itjust.works 4 points 1 month ago

Old-school example: Aidyn Chronicles: The First Mage. I didn't know much about it other than it was an RPG when I got it, but I enjoyed it more than it probably deserved, given all the problems it has.

Newer example: Dragon Quest Builders 2. I don't like Minecraft at all, but DQB2 was like crack to me. I even platinumed it, which I very rarely do. Very sad that there's no announced DQB3.

[–] kubok@fedia.io 4 points 1 month ago

Vampire Survivors. The premise and gameplay are simple, but it is highly um.. replayable.

[–] blockheadjt@sh.itjust.works 4 points 1 month ago

Animal Crossing New Horizons

At first, my partner got it for herself. I figured I'd maybe watch a bit, maybe do something else.

I am now something of an expert on flower breeding, bug catching and determining if art is real.

[–] Kolanaki@pawb.social 4 points 1 month ago

Adastra. I am not that into VNs (I prefer actual games with more player agency and this particular VN has basicslly no choices to make; it is purely a story) but this one got me to check out the developer's other VNs and they are all hella good (especially Circles and Echo which actually have multiple story lines based on your choices).

Now I am waiting for the sequel, Khemia, to finish being written. I've played through what there is twice (the first time being before the first chapter was completely rewritten) and I am finding it very hard to be patient and wait for the whole thing.

[–] imetators@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Detroit: Become Human. I skipped it it when it was released and totally never played it. Recently I got it on discount and tried it out. Even my wife is extremely invested in the story and she doesn't even play games.

Psychonauts. I just saw a few times this game on some top game lists and decided to try. Man, this game fucking rocks! Also, Psychonauts 2 is also epic and Compton's level should be made into a standalone game! What an epic imagination devs at Double fine have!

Rust. I was there during Beta. Me and one my friend had fun. But once Garry had remade it to what it is today, we tried to play with more people. I hate the game but it is also so much fun with friends.

Heavy modded Minecraft. Once only vanilla payer, my friends finally convinced me to play TPPI with them. Never going back to vanilla.

[–] SaraTonin@lemmy.world 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

There’s a great video on YouTube of a speedrunner doing Psychonauts in front of a room full of the devs, at least some of whom are a bit drunk

[–] imetators@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 1 month ago

I have watched both Psychonauts and Psychonauts 2 speedruns. Second one was fun cause they only had this game released for a year. So speedrunner was rubbing their bugs all over their faces during that. Hilarious watch it was.

[–] mesamunefire@piefed.social 4 points 1 month ago

Hadies.

I dont typically like rougelikes in any form. But the story, gameplay loop, and music is some of the best.

Hadies 2 just made everything better.

[–] DarkFuture@lemmy.world 4 points 1 month ago

Ghostwire: Tokyo

I got it free on Epic. I was in a slump without anything I was excited to play so I fired it up. Loved exploring Tokyo. The quests were great. Gameplay was fun. Main story kept me interested. Looked awesome. Was really pleasantly surprised by it.

[–] Tuxman@sh.itjust.works 4 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Gris

I was looking for a game to play with my daughter and I saw it included in the Apple Arcade subscription.

…. I don’t remember ugly bawling like that at the end of a game. Truly a work of art.

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[–] BurgerBaron@piefed.social 4 points 1 month ago

Promise Mascot Agency has me entranced at the moment, I can't put it down. I love zooming around in a Kei Truck drowning in financial despair trying to desperately keep my ailng Yakuza family afloat while also helping reject mascots (species, not a costume) and our agency (and some bored gods mistaken as mascots) in a corrupt town while also trying to help a giant living severed toe win an election against the vile mayor. While also trying to figure out why Yakuza are cursed to die if they stay there for too long. Bunch of shadowy ghosts all over...watching me...

Combat is card based by recruiting helpful citizens, cats, cosplaying heroes, etc from the town but combat is actually just trying to help mascots recover from something comically/socially embarassing while on a job like getting stuck wedged in a door frame or knocking boxes over. Yep.

It"s a little grindy/repetitive especially "combat" scenarios once you've seen them all, but that's a consequence of a very limited development budget I think.

Overall it's crack cocaine / 10 for me and didn't expect to get so attached going in almost blind. It scratches a sort of Deadly Premonition kinda itch, but this game is technically much better/competently made.

[–] Hadriscus@jlai.lu 4 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Disco Elysium..., totally not my kind of game, gameplay-wise. I reluctantly accepted to give it a go after my best friend sold it to me passionately. and damn

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[–] HeyJoe@lemmy.world 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Since i follow a lot of big games i normally can figure out what i would like since i am easy to please. I can only think of one game that i picked up that got me hooked and surprised me which was Cat Quest. I probably am thinking about it because im now playing the 3rd one which was free on psn for members.

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[–] Nomad 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)
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[–] lazycouchpotato@lemmy.world 3 points 1 month ago

Teardown

I assumed it would be more of a sandbox with a singleplayer campaign for the sake of it but it was very well flushed out. Thoroughly enjoyed it.

[–] idunnololz@lemmy.world 3 points 1 month ago

Minecraft.

I didnt grow up with it and non of my friends had played it. I always thought it was a kids game. During covid a friend started a server and I joined in. I was surprised by the depth of the game and just how much there was to do.

[–] EndlessNightmare@reddthat.com 3 points 1 month ago

Deep Rock Galactic. Even after a few years, I still regularly play this one with a group of friends.

[–] Mesa@programming.dev 3 points 1 month ago

I played Warframe for about 3 years before I realized it was my favorite game ever. As in I was 12 when I started playing, and at the time, it was just what I had. It wasn't until I got my first personal gaming laptop and began playing on there that I realized how much I liked it, and started engaging in the community more.

JoeAAverage, if you're out there: Thanks, man. It may have seemed like a small gift at the time—especially for an already 3-year player—but now, 11 years in, I still can't be certain that I would've realized how cool of a game I had in my hands had you not gifted me that Limbo set. Limbo may be forgotten by DE, and I may not play him much anymore, but he will always be my favorite frame.

[–] BigBananaDealer@lemmy.world 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

marvel's midnight suns. the only other turn based game ive played was fallout 1. i just expected something to scratch my superhero video game itch and instead found a new favorite. im on my 2nd playthrough now and still loving it. my favorite "relaxing" game

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